L5R – JYTB Campaign Report 1

From last week, our cast is noted here and an overview of this version of Rokugan here.  It was a short session what with finishing up characters and learning or relearning the rules.

It is early Sping, Kiau Yo, Soshi Utami and Usagi Okakura having completed their gempukku have -all independantly- been sent to seek answers t0 the Lonely Mountain Shrine to Kumoko-no-Kami, the Fortune of Redemption.   The shrine is located high on a mountainside from which the Isles of Silk and Spices can be seen on a clear day.  The only way to reach it is by winding mountain roads.

The story begins at Small Lake Village, a Crane holding at the base of the mountain route to LMS.  Small, 30 families, overseen by the elderly Crane magistrate Daidoji Dayu.  The only inn is the Clear Skies Inn, a surprisingly nice place, where the characters meet and are warned about bandits by the Magistrate.

End of day one brings the travelers to Mountain Shadow Village, a hamlet of 12 families who gather wood and mushrooms from the mountains.  The Inn is called the Blessing of the Mountain Kami, notable for it spring feed baths.  The character talk, and play Go, with two Cranes visiting the inn.

As they head through the morning fog, they are attacked by bandits.   As is often true in L5R, it is fast and brutal.  The six lesser bandits are brutally killed and their leader is severely wounded, as is the Usagi.  Moving slowly their make it to the Moon Viewing Inn at the top of a pass just after dark.  A small cluster of houses form a proto-village to support the inn.  The bandit leader is executed after questioning.

The character locate the bandit camp in the morning, finding little of value.  Continuing on they reach Lonely Mountain Shrine, which is tended by a small community of nuns, at the end of the day.

That is where we ended.  Next week we will pick up at the Shrine, where each character gets to ask one question of their haunting ancestor that will be answered truthfully.